MP 1687: The Set Down | Barber IndyCar Review from YouTube

Welcome to the Marshall Pruitt podcast coming out of good old Barber Motorsports Park.

This is the first episode of the set down also known as a little insight and analysis

and prize giving awards giving that we do after each IndyCar race started that here

just the beginning of this season huge thanks to y'all for supporting the show to our great

friends at thejusticebrothers.com and torunmotorsports.com for all they do to support us.

Big thanks to our friend as well Steve Seacore helping me to put together this content here so

hopefully more to come more fun to come. I'm going to try something a little bit new it's old with

my audio podcast but boy just been thinking about a lot of the really fun whether it's in-car audio

that I have trackside ambient audio try and put some of those up here on YouTube specifically just

kind of stare at a picture and hopefully zone out and listen to amazing race car sounds so

going to get that coming here shortly knowing that we have a little bit of a pause between Barber

good old children's of Alabama Indy Grand Prix and the Long Beach Grand Prix here middleish to late

middle portion of April all right let's get rolling with things and stuff

going to get into the awards here in a moment got one new one to add by the way but

let's open with the obvious this race was not particularly entertaining in terms of folks

challenging for the lead on track wheel to wheel same way last year though Scotty McLaughlin beat

up on folks the year before that in the year before that and pillow kind of so Barber is proving

to be in this arrow screen era especially as we've added the hybrid to the vehicles here

been a pretty decent one person stands out one big haymaker to the rest of the field and off they

go don't know what IndyCar would do for next year but if we're just talking about spicing

things up true wheel-to-wheel competition as the Barber race takes place

if that's something IndyCar wants to make sure is a thing it's got some work to do

I'm not bothered by what we saw maybe I'm a little bit different than some who are very

loud and complaining about this being a bit of a nothing burger in terms of real entertainment

and excitement can't argue that fact strictly from what we saw take place on track I do love

the strategic side though thanks to Christian Lindgard and the Aaron McLaren team and good

old Kyle Moyer his new race strategist of this season but truly one of the great race strategists

of this century they were able to do some cool things so we'll get into that in a moment but

just the big picture we had a st. Petersburg race that was pretty fun parts of it were fun but

alex mollywopped everybody other parts of it though were entertaining get to phoenix that was

pretty much just a huge ball of fun the whole time Christian Rasmussen doing huge razz like things

Joseph Newgarden was the best driver terms of getting to the finish line and beat up on folks

ran away with things there to close but we then get to Arlington that seemed like pretty decent fun

yet again another kind of sort of runaway winner that being our man Kirk Kirkwood by the way I saw

Kirk on pit lane before the race and said do you know that there's some folks like in the comments

who just freak out all caps to stop calling you Kirk or Kirk Kirkwood and he had a bit of a laugh

we also agreed next time I have him on the show for those who aren't familiar

or maybe missed out on some of the comments he's just going to lay into me and basically

threaten me big time that if I ever call him Kirk again like he's going to do terrible stuff but

for those who don't know we actually get along pretty decently outside the track so when I call

him Kirk by the way it's me calling a friend a nickname it's not anything that's actually mean

or bad or otherwise so just sharing up front but saw Kirk definitely had some thoughts about the

fact that you know you beat up on folks really badly at Arlington you think you can do anything

like that here go get Polo starting a little bit farther back from him than you wanted told me on

pit lane obviously I'm going to try felt like we could have done a little bit better and qualifying

than we wanted but spoke to him again today all totaled was pretty happy with how things played

out the year-to-year improvement for Andretti was definitely noticeable for himself will power who

will talk about more and Marcus Erickson but this was truly yet another virtuoso performance by

Alex Polo and that number 10 car so I mentioned in the setup pre-race preview this was going to be

the huge question of the four big teams Ganassi, Penske, Andretti, Aero McLaren, First Natural

Train road course who's going to step up who's going to stand out will we going to see any big

year-to-year gains we're going to see anybody fall short but normally does super well on road

courses what did we learn it was silly to question whether Polo and the Ganassi team was going to do

anything other than stomp a mud hole into folks so Ganassi yeah road courses this is something

we need to watch for sure Aero McLaren we saw Christian Lungard do big things but he was singular

in that capacity same with Polo at Ganassi although Scott Dixon did as usual to recover

from a poor qualifying performance this season to have a pretty decent finish but at Ganassi it was

just Alex at McLaren it was just Lungard and Andretti we don't know how well power could have

done obviously big crash in qualifying not his fault ended up starting 23rd almost last

rallied up to 12th Marcus Erickson did well wasn't really super crazy competitive in terms of fighting

for a podium but he was in a good place but pretty much down to Kirk he ended up starting finishing

fifth for rent around third fourth fifth but mostly fourth fifth area but better than ever

just a little bit farther from Polo than he had hoped and then you look at team Penske

and Scotty McLaughlin's crash certainly just an error that he made but set him back a bit he's

normally been their front runner New Garden I would say did well definitely running strong again

which is just great to see for him Davey Maluchus though the best qualifier at team Penske this

season tied with Alex Polo 4.3 average starting position as the best in IndyCar who would have

predicted that I wouldn't have but indeed Davey Maluchus showing us that this kid he's got something

and got it early I expected this to be a mid to late season thing for him way the hell off raising

my hand saying no Pruitt you're an idiot again for those of you who know me it's not a surprise but

Davey Maluchus has been the best Penske driver across all four races combined this is something to

really truly appreciate for him so I'd say of the four big teams we were watching on the who's

going to show up at the first big road course knowing that we've got six of them this year

this is going to be a huge indicator as to who's going to be a problem at the others

indeed same old story with Polo will power without that crash and qualifying certainly

feel like it would have been much farther up so really could have been two of the three

Andretti's it feels like fast six looking at the Aaron McLaren none of them were particularly fast

in qualifying yet another thing to consider about the season they've had that's been just a little

bit off but then a hell of a rally in the race with Lundgaard matching Polo if not exceeding

Polo's pace at times so that was huge really I'd say of the four Penske's the only one that stood

out as truly a team wide force true speeding capabilities all weekend obviously Davey was

the one to do the best in the race so interesting look I don't know about you again please tell me

in the comments and more all caps about calling Kirk Kirkwood Kirk Kirkwood tell me were there

others within there that I'm maybe not seeing in terms of the big four doing a little better a

little worse feels like Polo and Ganassi is kind of an obvious thing but Lundgaard and

Aaron McLaren gave us a real reason to wonder when we get to the Indianapolis Grand Prix

that guy's been pretty damn good there before could we be looking at I don't know if I'd call it

an upset but could we get a pole could we get a win at a Lundgaard there based on Barber I wouldn't

be surprised but who else stood out to you as the who we saw something here that could foretell

what's going to happen at the five remaining road courses forgot to mention by the way hope

you like the new backdrop here ordered this a good while ago legitimately wasn't sure if it was

going to show up and there was a heck of a wonderful little ring at the good old doorbell

here on Monday so I loved everything about the factory Porsche cart Indy car series program

was super fortunate to see it from its debut Laguna Seca to its farewell had a opportunity to

go to work for the team and this tells you how questionable my skills were had the opportunity

a friend of mine my crew chief the team I was working on SCCA pro racing team in 1990 told me

hey just spoke to my friend who works on the factory Porsche team this would have been the

fosters sponsored car so final season and said they need a mechanic for the second I think it was

wasn't just the spare car but like the second spare car I think I think I'm remembering that

correctly but it wasn't even like hey man you're going to be in charge of the spare car and it's

a big like responsibility and boy that's going to show people it was like man you're one step

above being in charge of maintaining the golf cart but anyways I think it paid $30,000 would

involve moving all the way across the country from California to Pennsylvania the Holbert team

that was running it Walker team I should say an evolution of the Holbert team but I decided to

not take that opportunity which would have been my first opportunity to work in the car Indy car

series that would come later in the decade I kicked myself for not taking that but at the same time

I also have to acknowledge that even though I wasn't smart enough to take it it's actually a good

thing I didn't because the team was shuttered at the end of the year so truly I could have been

accepting a job moving all the way across the country for like three months of work and then

finding myself on all my possessions way far away from yeah so but anyways this is just prior to that

this is the March 89p designed by the great Tino Belly who is Indy cars current and somewhat

long-standing I think his title is head of aerodynamic development but yeah Tino just a

Welshman who's really smart and has designed some great Indy cars this being one of them

love everything this is a photo taken by my dear friend supplied to me by the great Dan Arboyd so

anyways I've been waiting for this for a long while and it finally showed up so

anyways this is it I'm going to stick with this unless something else jumps up that I feel like

I need to have made this is probably going to be it for a while so if you love it then this is amazing

and if for whatever reason you'd hate it I just have to ask like when did you join Al Qaeda how

could you hate the Quaker State green amazing March Porsche 89p driven by tail phobby like

and if you've never heard of any of those things it's worth doing a little bit of googling I even have

a little docu something that I made however many years ago about Porsche's factory

cart Indy car series team so you might check it out here but anyways I don't know why I just

decided to throw that in but hey that's kind of me let's move on to one or two other things

then we'll dive into our awards and put a relatively Barbary barber that was just Alex doing things

so boy got to barber a day later than anticipated I want to keep bringing this up it's not intentional

it's just explaining what is reality with the cancer fight that we're back into I'm just trying

to shorten my travel as much as possible till it feels like we really get things on track and

solidified so ended up flying out catching a flight that ended up running late I think I got into my

barber hotel feel like I got to bed around 2am maybe Saturday morning covered the session remotely

in the airport here in good old San Jose and yeah but got in hit the ground was at the track by

like 8am and I am telling you that my good old phone here I got my little Justin Wilson sticker

on the back I've had for many years I was typing into the notes app non-stop about talking to this

person who always knows about this thing and that person who knows that and just a lot of news

gathering y'all so let's talk any 500 entries should hopefully have a story up on racer about

maybe by the time you're seeing this recording this early on a Tuesday evening probably won't

be going up until I'm guessing Wednesday who knows what time but any 500 entry stuff the

able motorsports team putting in an entry was told it'd be going in Monday morning but they're

putting in an entry haven't heard that the Chevy engine supply is a done deal but heard enough

suggesting that that's where it's going to believe that it's more of just a formality than anything

great young kid who my friend Chris Wheeler dubbed finger licking fast because he's from Kentucky

good old Jacob Abel should be in that car the kid's good enough to where there's no reason he

shouldn't be in the field this time so hopefully that all goes well all goes according to plan

might have read some stuff about with the couple of formula two races being bounced because of the

war we're currently in right now Middle Eastern conflict in general had a couple of those events

formula one events come off the books along with the F2 components so looking at some

makeup events here read something on racer.com today by my colleague Chris Medland about the

Miami Grand Prix could indeed be a place where one of those F2 races gets made up that's the

beginning of May so no real conflict for Colton Hurta in terms of being able to do the Indy 500

in a fourth and Dreddy entry but also keep hearing there could be a Canada component

added for an F2 makeup which would kind of sort of get really uncomfortably close to the Indy 500

knowing all of that posed that question to Indreddy team principal Ron Razuski on pre-grid on Sunday

oh hey keep hearing about potential conflicts or things that could impede Colton's free return

to be the Indy 500 driver of choice also mentioned never confirmed that's happening so

fair enough uh but of the driver we kind of sort of believe was going to be the one since

Marco and Dreddy is retired Ron just shared hey I'm waiting to receive information just

like many of y'all mentioned that TWG Motorsports or is TWG Motorsports uh Boston Towers in Japan

for the Japanese Grand Prix was basically trying to sort that stuff out so as of Sunday afternoon

no word as to whether Colton would be in that car or not just share this and this is my own

thoughts so this team is effectively self-funded realize that they have some sponsors that you

recognize that aren't within the TWG cascade of businesses but for the most part they compete

on their own terms meaning I'd be very surprised to learn that there's a big external sponsor for

a fourth car that they contractually have to put in the field to represent that sponsor it could be

the case and I could be totally wrong but I'd be surprised I mentioned that for a reason running

Colton at the 500 in the fourth car makes total sense been really good at the 500 done it many

times should be instantly competitive along with the rest of their drivers

but if Colton's not able to and there's no big sponsor that they have to put on a car I do wonder

if they would see the reason to put that fourth car in the field we know that between good old

Kirk between Marcus and between power that's a really fricked strong Indy 500 package there

without Colton who's just a natural fit to do that I don't know why they would want to just

put one in for the sake of it unless Roger Penske asked trying to get to that minimum entry list

number of 33 to maintain the traditional 11 rows of three after that I am aware of every driver

with a budget seemingly having reached out to them saying hey you guys haven't announced what you're

doing with that fourth car but I've got a budget and sure would love to drive I've spoken to some

of those drivers in various ways not so long ago they said we were listened to and very politely

heard but this is not a team that's going to be moved by the money that anyone's offering unless

it's just stupid money average asking price for an Indy 500 seat this year from those that I've asked

somewhere between 1.5 to 1.7 million 1.5 keeps being repeated as kind of the average number

of herd drivers having between 1.5 1.7 almost 2 million as well by one driver so

if anywhere between 1.5 to 2 million dollars is not something that would move the needle for a team

like Andretti Global which it would not going to close here on this that if it ain't Colton

then it should be someone they feel can go out and win in that car not hope could but like we know

well Ryan Hunter Ray's taken he's at Aero McLaren who else is out there we can run through the list

of folks who like we most of us I think love Jair Hildebrand let's call him he nearly won on debut

I got that won his Indy NXT championship with Andretti got that that was 15 plus years ago

the people in charge who are running it now and own it now no connection whatsoever what was done

a long time ago would not move the needle with the folks in charge today your Stefan Wilson's

Jacob Abel we think is going to be with his family team but Devlin De Francesco is out there looking

Catherine Legg is looking etc like a number of drivers who can we love and would root for etc

but from a step in the car and we know you can win the Indy 500 standpoint they have that belief

in Colton I don't know if anybody else that I can think of would fall into that kind of

high high level of qualification to get that nod Linus Lundqvist for sure impressed on multiple

ovals as a rookie I don't know if that's something they would look at for him believe there's a bit

of a Chevy alignment that he has in the background so if it ain't Colton I don't know if it would

be anybody else premmas another one that stands out they've been spoken to by everybody with a

budget about possibly doing something at the 500 keep hearing that Catherine Legg is could be a strong

candidate there she I know has some pretty good support both from GM is what I keep hearing

and also pretty strong financial package behind her some very motivated folks who want her in

the field Stefan Wilson comes to mind a few others again kind of all the same names

but keep hearing that could see them personnel wise some folks show up at Long Beach potential

owners there some more meetings with the series potentially the able angle is an interesting

one with them expecting to get being expected to receive one of the two motors that were

being saved for Prema it would tell you assuming all that goes forward Chevy Indy car you name it has

come to the realization that let's go with the guaranteed thing here because Abel's been real

from the beginning got the car got the people got the budget got the driver then let's see if

hopefully Prema can get in if we were to get the Abel and Andretti cars in that's 33 with Abel

32 question markers we've gone over about Andretti there then seems to be an option of

a leg Chevy Prema type solution which I've heard a lot about at Barber also heard I know that our

friend Larry Foyt has publicly repeatedly said well I don't want to run a third car for the 500

also shared that with that Penske technical alliance you would think that if Roger asked just

from them making sure we get to the field of 33 standpoint Larry would probably be the first

team to receive that request if not him then trying to work with Prema to make that happen

I've heard both scenarios in terms of Catherine being in with that aforementioned Chevy support

in her own sponsorship as well so 32 with Abel if that does indeed get confirmed but we know

that an entry's gone in waiting to learn about Andretti if so Indy has its 33 wouldn't need

anymore to fill the grid but if you want some fun if you want a reason to really follow all

aspects of qualifying weekend you'd hope the 34 emerges could that be Prema with a single car

for Catherine or Foyt with a single car for Catherine those are two options that I definitely

heard a lot about at good old Barber one other big learning and educational point at Barber was

about a couple of potential events not on the immediate horizon for Indy car but ones that

talks are currently taking place so I'll fire that into a story on racer.com here shortly but

I left about truly about 10 of the other items that I was just firing into my little notes app

the whole time but yeah rarely does like a day and a halfish at an event yield that much information

but for whatever reason at least for me while the race might not have been the most memorable

thing ever everything leading up to it talking to folks in the paddock non-stop wandering down in

between transporters and trying not to be seen or sitting at little tables over here whatever

it was a fertile time in good old Alabama and also got to go and see the original home in 1975

for the BMW factory Emsa team so filmed a little bit of that got some old historic photos from

my friend Tom Placinski at BMW so I'll try and fart that into a separate little video here but

let's get into our awards dang it top rebounder I feel like that's got to go to good old will

power from Tewoomba Australia I'm going to mention power more than once here in some awards this one

to me starting p23 finishing p12 boy that was no joke for a guy dj willy p also have to appreciate

the fact that as a result of the rear brakes failing the opening round qualifying on saturday

he didn't even get a chance to get into any of his faster firestone alternate tires as a result

he and his race strategist Ron Razewski they had a heck of a bunch of brand new pretty and ready to

deliver alternates and other than starting on primaries they took those off and spent the rest

of the race rocketing around on alternates so a negative in the sense that obviously had a crash

started 23rd was able to improve all those positions that's the thing that tends to really

stink with a bad qualifying at barber it's not as if you can't pass but making up significant

ground is often a challenge so the timing of that crash pre alternate tire consumption

was really really a favorable thing but they were able to use as an advantage here in the race

to climb from 23rd 12th so 11 spots worth of improvement definitely the top rebounder

for who fell short i feel like that one's almost as obvious as our guy will power

pato ward is a strange weekend in the sense that we had both pato at arrow mclaren really just

on a different planet and not a happy planet as he told me after the race he uses some adult

language so if you were a child there are some earmuffs moments coming up here from our guy pato

we had pato qualifying poorly lungard didn't qualify super super well qualified 10th

but both race strategy and just his in-race performance car is obviously really good but

he had a huge disparity between pato and i think finished 18th or something like that

lungard p2 definite strategically help for lungard but huge separation there

i'm not necessarily going to put the rll team in the who fell short overall capacity because

graham rayhall started third ran second for a long time finished third but his teammates were

same kind of thing just about as far back as back can go was happy to see a little bit unrelated

here but just kind of fell into this this topical moment looking at mick schumacher switch here to

the awesome and amazing white haired eddie jones coming back to help he's really stepped away

from full-time indy car now comes back for the 8500 with rll with takuma sato but we see that

something i've been mentioning a little bit here during the opening month that i don't know if

we're going to get too far into the season before change happens with mix race engineering solution

indeed it moved mike palowski to a engineering r&d role they're really excited about that but

eddie jones has agreed to come back engineer mick for barber long beach and the indy grand

pre and look after takuma at the indy open test indy 500 then they'll see what they do after that

hoping that eddie really loves working with mick and he'll want to continue from detroit onwards

with him but they didn't get everything they wanted obviously out of their first weekend together

mick had a stall during i think his second pit stop fell back and ended up finishing last next

to last way towards the back not really something you can put into a finishing result but the vibe

and i know it might sound stupid to be like hey the vibe was better but the result was terrible

but it does matter things are getting a little bit heavy they're feeling like underperforming

the connection between mike and mick wasn't there wasn't improving it was just actually getting

worse and so the change to eddie asked throughout the weekend asked before i flew asked once i got

there asked after qualifying just through the race there's something there that they can build on so

in that case i look away from the not wonderful qualifying that he had

race result certainly not something he's super happy about but potential so eddie plus mick

it feels like this can go places knowing eddie's just a legend done huge things

dario frankiedi on down for so long so the potential for greatness exists for the first

time with mick here's an indy car rookie we'll see how much they're able to get

the louis foster side talking about the disparity between graham and his teammates this has been

a bizarre sophomore season for louis so looking at who fell short i don't know if i so much look

at louis as an individual certainly look at the disparity between graham so far ahead of his teammates

all weekend long big question mark coming out qualifying warm up both drivers trying to use

really learn see what graham was doing if it was any better than what they were doing with their

setups didn't necessarily lead them anywhere but you have this big gap louis in particular

i know that he had a good qualifying at st pete but rest of the season's just been strange

i know how good the kid is anyone who's seen him drive knows this kid is special

think it's time to move that baton of chemistry are things working are things not working

had one of the softer rookie of the year campaigns that i can remember

obviously great pole position know that but

just as mick has undergone an engineering change i do wonder if before the season gets

too much farther along might be time to think about a change there it's totally commonplace

nor is it a it's not a blame thing it's just when you look at the offensive coordinator

and the quarterback or the head coach in the quarterback and you know that you have a quarterback

that can be an all-star and that kind of performance is not coming forth on a regular basis

you start to look at the other folks who are directly involved with them and ask the natural

question do we need to make some changes here and if those changes don't work you've got some

answers that maybe tell you you don't have a quarterback who is true all-star capable

looking at how louis start to the season has just been a super nothing burger finishing last at

barber just a rough time extra pit stop thrown in as well so some stuff to think about here knowing

how well graham did there's no reason for the others to be that far behind so on the who fell

short pato stands out as the clear clear winner of that award that nobody wants to win only other

one i'd throw in and tell me if you think this is on base or off base really only familiar with

off base so i don't know why through an on base but hey uh ecr so alexander rossi started 11th

finished 11th not bad not bad we saw some encouraging things though definitely arlington

to make us think that i realize that's a street course in this discipline of road racing

was thinking that there might have been a little bit more on display at barber didn't really see that

and then countered rossi's decent fast 12 performance with christian rasmussen

who was very quick at arlington obviously a rocket at phoenix but was nowhere the entire time at

barber qualified 17th 8 whatever it was barely even knew uh he was there but i guess this could

also maybe fall into a vague compliment zone maybe ecr has been noticeably better this year

a little bit odd to see that as a whole they were decent definitely decent with rossi

nowhere with raz i like the fact that this is something at least for me to be surprised about

where a year ago two years ago ecr not being a thing that we really even notice at barber

would not have stood out whatsoever i like the fact that it stood out to me as hmm

i i'm sure they're going to be better the fact that they weren't there at least stuck in my brain

a bit let's talk about who overperformed and i think ray hall definitely fits into that category

shouldn't be a surprise though i know the internet seemingly collectively hates graham

fair enough not one of them granted i'm not the internet thankfully but for him to be third

at phoenix and qualifying realize that fell a little bit short and where he finished there i

think ninth or so but for him to qualify third for the second time out of four races held this year

this just isn't the thing that was supposed to be possible according to everybody who hates graham

and yet he's really fast in his race engineer are doing really good things

i love the potential so did anybody have graham graham didn't even have himself as qualifying

p3 and finishing p3 at barber leading into barber nobody had this and so i love that for him

love if this can continue street course stuff good the two that we've had so far not amazing

long beach is going to be an area where of the many teams looking to improve i guess i'm already

doing the long beach setup but this is going to be one or if they are real they're going to have

to show it there i'll shut up now and save more of that for the setup but at least for the set down

here graham i definitely thought stood out more than anyone else on who overperformed tell me

if there's anybody else you think certainly belongs in that conversation i'll just circle

back to lungard for where they started to where they finished lungard gets the nod

pardoned who the heck thought graham was going to be on the podium at any point in time before the

race uh so i'm a little bit torn truly tell me which one you think is the right one and the

reason why i'm gonna go graham because lungard doing that in an air mclaren car not a surprise

rll hasn't really been a team doing this kind of stuff we know that they were super good last

year in the indy road course but for them to do it at a different road course not being louis

foster as well or mic but indeed good old put them out to pasture graham um i thought that's

pretty cool uh would say pit stop champs we got to talk about for sure because really for the

second race in a row big part of graham success the fact that he could roll on to pit lane and roll

out as fast if not faster than anybody so here we are yet again rll that number 15 honda pit

crew of his they are killing it so love seeing that for them mentioned yet again good pal kyle

sagan their pit stop coach there's a reason why such folk here nascar wherever else are such

high value commodities so takes a great driver to do great things on track you get to pit lane

and have folks who are doing great things as well he end up standing on the podium like he did so

huge kudos one more pit stop champs item to throw out and they weren't the fastest but they were the

ones that weren't spoken about and that indeed is a victory that being in dready global after

collective three car bed poopage at arlington wasn't a thing at barba right how could that be

shouldn't a team granted this was also just like the overreaction event of all time or stretch of

all time um they didn't have any problems to me that really stood out slowed anybody down in any

appreciable way how could they go from being so collectively bad and error prone to not even a

thing all cleaned up in the span of one race had a person who would know tell me this could be right

could be wrong but tell me that we know that every team is working towards any little improvement

they can make during pit stops with their equipment for sure one of the things that teams do that are

really serious about pit lane they don't just take the wheel gun the socket that comes with it and

just use it as is they're looking for any little areas of optimization one of the things one of the

known things that gets done inside the socket themselves is a rubber o-ring o-ring is what

grabs the wheel nut when it's coming off the car basically holds it in the socket well the release

if the o-ring is too much grip to it um that is something that could indeed lose you a little

tiny fraction of time the viscosity of the o-ring itself is something that teams play with one that

would release the wheel nut a little bit faster again a millionth of a second i'm exaggerating but

it's a small little thing but potentially an area of improvement some teams try and improve this a

little bit but don't go as far as they possibly could for wheel nut release o-ring viscosity

optimization god don't ask me to say that twice some others say hey we found something that works

good it's not too crazy it doesn't like barely hold on to the wheel nut or just spit the thing out

the belief was the indreddy team been experimenting and might have gone a little bit too far in that

regard so why would all of a sudden wheel nut after wheel nut fall from the sockets was also told

this wasn't something that really just happened for the first time this season at arlington with

them just had happened before some previous races just was caught and rectified before it really

slowed down the stop so wasn't the first time i'm told but wasn't a real problem in the compounding

manner that it was at arlington so i don't know if it was the singular change made my guess based

on the intel from someone who would absolutely know about these things on pit lane was that we

might have seen a change in the o-rings used by the team which would have then led to the hey you

know who we had nothing to talk about pit stop wise at barber indreddy which is kind of the way it

should go um why don't we close on two other quickish awards the kicked in the crotch i gotta

say that's our guy will power think about scottie mack and his huge crash frightening obviously

error made on entry got up onto the curb wheel onto the grass a little bit but went from grippy

road to non grippy surface car spun went in crashed kind of sort of punched through a

little bit too much of the barrier for anyone's liking thank goodness nobody was standing behind

that i remember when i was actively shooting photographs they always said yeah don't go stand

back there so that's just been a bit of a ongoing warning i believe but still some things to think

about i'll come back to this will power kicked in the crotch award in just a moment but had this

conversation with a number of folks after scottie max crash heck even will powers crash

a lot of veterans walk around this track from the series safety officials

race officials standard practice for them to do a bit of a full course inspection look at everything

and let me just walk around the track drive around the track but get up into the corners

shake things move things look around see if you like stuff tell folks to change things move things

if you don't think it's done the right way or safe enough but i do wonder if there needs to be the

absence of race officials veterans i wonder if there needs to be some form of worst case scenario

crew folks who aren't looking at their millionth corner and millionth barrier and fence and tire

bay like folks who actually i'm not saying don't know anything about racing but haven't seen something

enough to be effectively not blind to it but name anything in your life that you're used to doing or

seeing a lot of it stop standing out as like striking and stop you in your tracks it's inevitable

when you got into your car today did you really notice every facet of the seat and or did you

just kind of slide in buckle and go again i think for most of us there are many things that we do

in a routine manner that just become patterned what do we do to add some folks total failure of

imagination group worst case scenario group hey we're racing professionals who see the stuff for

a living and of course we spot things we don't like but it's usually based on experience seen it a

bunch that stands out fix it bring it into line i'm not talking about needing those folks i'm talking

the yeah haven't don't know a bunch about this maybe again i don't know what discipline they'd

come from one thing i'd say for sure veteran photographers was saying this to my friend

mike levitt about the veteraniest indy car photographer as you're going to find these days

stands behind more barriers more fences see more of this stuff from the backside up close

having to think about his own mortality of race cars coming at him at unimaginable rates i've

been in many of those same corners with mike for a super long time someone like a levitt or similar

who can give you the backside account and go you you know have you looked at this if a car were to

come in at this way it could indeed punch through just like we saw scottie at this place at that

place i'm not saying indy car did a bad job the car was stopped it did move whatever it was

five ten feet however long punch back in right through the barrier i get that that would never

be considered a success so don't get me wrong but the car was stopped had it gone all the way through

i think we would have been talking about yeah we need to stop the event the car was arrested

from continuing but still seeing that crash seeing will's crash break failure going into turn five

hit nose first tire barrier in front of the steel armco behind it but went fast enough to

where the nose of the car punched in pushed through and actually bent the barrier back the steel

barrier back so it all worked as intended have to wonder though if you're still transferring

enough energy through a tire bale to bend steel back could there be more done there to slow the

car before it gets to such a place to then have way less speed and energy to bend steel barriers

same with scottie everyone's spoken about hey we do love the grass at barber motorsports park

rest in peace george barber who recently passed whose manicured grass was a huge point of pride

should we maybe think of something a little bit different on approach to the corner on driver's

right and definitely once you get past the corner into turn one anything that could slow the cars

down before getting into the barrier before potentially punching through like scottie did

maybe no grass here would be an okay thing just that failure of imagination worst case scenario

crew feels like that would be a worthy addition to see things that for those of us who do this for

a living we don't always see until there's a problem folks who would maybe have a better chance of

seeing things before it's a problem feel like that might not be a bad thing to consider

thing just to mention about the kicking the crotch and the power side as i am told

haven't seen it i'm having to take some more i'm gonna not include some other stuff i was told

because i would want to be able to verify that before mentioning it but was told the

route of the brake failure was the bursting of a rear brake line as to what caused that brake line

to open and then relieve pressure so that when will stepped on the brake pedal the brake fluid

was allowed to get out and basically spurred out and apply no pressure to the rear brakes

the things i've been told stand out to me is concerning as to what caused it if those accounts

i've heard some shades different shades of what happened concerning not really so much

about the indready team but i'll leave it at that but a opening of a brake line

um unintended undesired opening of a brake line randomly and immediately

unexpected relieving of pressure will stepped on the brakes no rear brakes big crash feel bad for

him if that didn't happen feel pretty confident would have been starting near kirk and finishing

possibly somewhere near him so would have been better he went into the race in 11th position

in the points fell back to 13th i believe so while the rally from 23rd to 12th was good

wasn't not a huge difference to get him into the top 10 but yeah this just felt like a

unfortunate kick to the crotch for him mentioned one final thing on the whole crashy stuff

happened to see McLaughlin's car go by being brought back from the crash site and then also

saw it again uh while being deconstructed and getting the spare car ready phenomenal job yet

again by team penske and doing that shouldn't be a surprise of getting a spare car turned around

strongest point in the car has become the arrow screen mounting to the tub behind the driver

basically the roll hoop mounting right atop the back of the tub behind the driver with the

arrow screen titanium frame that bolts in there it's really become like a superstructure that

didn't exist prior to 2020 that's a really good thing because the arrow screen superstructure

mounting point behind the driver to the tub is what stopped the car one of the cables could have

one cable if not more is what it from the side is what connected with the side of Scotty's car

at that roll hoop arrow screen connection point and that connection point itself that titanium

that steel is what held firm and stopped the car so one person on social media who took a shot

because i was crediting like hey here's another reason to appreciate how freaking safe indy cars

made the dw 12 it wasn't a blind thing of like let's just say something raw raw it was man this

thing keeps taking crazy ass hits that would probably cause some other cars to buckle and this

thing keeps standing up and protecting its drivers track safety improvements we know that needs to

happen for sure but just looking at the fact that this specific thing that was added in 2020

cockpit safety for reasons that i think most of us visualize from a forward standpoint something

coming back at the driver towards the arrow screen that the screen itself stops and repels causes to

bounce away i think that's how most of us look at this or maybe from above whether it's a rollover

car coming over above something to protect the driver that way just thinking of the fact that

this the roll hoop stands above the driver's helmet obviously but so does the arrow screen this is an

intentional design by indy car so anything that might come at the driver from over the arrow screen

and go back or from the side would all be over their helmet and this is indeed how things got

stopped so that the cable that struck the side of scottie's cars he came in hit that roll hoop

arrow screen mounting superstructure the tub right behind him held firm and stopped the car so again

you wish he had no reasons to shout out the great job in thinking this stuff all the way through

there could be some things we don't know of that haven't been thought through that will be exposed

in a future crash but at least for the ones that we've seen since the arrow screen arrived

despite all the complaints my own about how damn ugly the thing is

scottie mcgloughlin got out of the car uninjured went and qualified and had a pretty decent race

for what was possible close the show here with a new category i'm going to call this one search

party and that's for the driver who or team who just felt like went missing during the event

we know in the results pato probably fits that category but i would say the one that stands

out and it makes me sad because it's just hard not to love him his fro felix rozenkvist saw him

after the race you know saw me wave wave just like the sweetest guy well he's a sweetish guy but he

is the sweetest guy he is so damn fast so competitive makes every team he's ever driven for better

and i wish i could understand why this season specifically coming off a year where he finished

sixth in the championship this has just been a where is he where are you what like for those of

us who've been around for a little while there used to be a thing on milk cartons where you'd put

a picture of missing children thinking that in theory everybody in america wakes up and

has milk and you see the kid and before the internet that was an actual version of an

i guess jeez that was our amber alert holy crap i just put that together milk cartons used to be

the country's amber alert system wow anyways that's just what comes to mind here of like

fro in his face on a milk carton it's not as if he's forgotten how to drive he's gotten amazing

race engineer and ross bennell amazing crew amazing everything there's just been a disconnect

qualifying eh he's normally a rocket on road courses street courses in particular

oval the guy is always facing the potential of doing amazing things this year has just been a

little and then to get to the first road course where it felt like after three races that were

decent but not really anywhere close to what was expected to pick up from p six last year to have

fro don't know where it was not strictly a driver thing right it's never just the driver you're

missing the whole weekend there's always some sort of extenuating circumstance usually others

involved so can't pin this on him but as an individual but indeed um maybe it was the liveries

granted his teammate marcus armstrong was quick the whole time finished p six he continues to

stand out like mad that's been the other thing this year that stands out as so strange not that

marcus is doing so well but the fact there's been more often than not a noticeable gap between these

two really didn't exist before not a surprise to see armstrong leveling up expected that predicted

that it's going exactly as expected but if that was the case i would have expected marcus to be

p six and fro p seven not p 13 p 14 i think there were seven ish positions between where they finished

here it was like nine um not so long ago arlington obviously fro was doing well had that penalty

that set him way back but in the challenge of who gets to the finish line first be it on pure

speed with no interruptions or no errors right whether it's a driving error lock up a break

give up some positions spin pass someone before you should get penalized all of these things

are there for drivers to do or not do it has just been strange to see yet again another search party

moment for fro i'll look to arlington as the thing that encourages me for long beach so i'll

stop from going farther and taking away more from what's coming up in the long beach set up feeling

for our guy fro this is a team i'll just keep mentioning neither driver is signed for 2027

they are in a constant race by race evaluation by their team for do we extend

contract offers and make big financial tenders to them both just one or neither i'd say based

on the foray sample we have so far marcus armstrong staying in that number 66 no brainer guys been

really fricking good and i think he's only going to keep getting better this season someone else

could certainly make him an offer for him to want to leave although i think he loves things there

for sure i don't know if he'd want to fro just as a guy who you if you know him at all you gotta

love fro knowing what he was able to do last year just truly hoping whatever it is i'm hoping the

search party comes to an end talk a little bit more about that in our long beach set up but for

now let's say farewell what's thinking about doing some of these kind of short and i also realized

we got like two weeks a long beach so hopefully if you wanted it you got a really long episode if

not you certainly have time well you're a if not you're no longer watching so why am i wasting

any words but if by chance you're coming back that's the thing that i do sometimes if i don't have

the hour or two for a podcast i'll consume 10 or 15 minutes when i can and come back so hopefully

for those of you who are choosing to do that thank you for being here um say farewell as always with

a big thanks to y'all to our good friends of the justice brothers in toronto motorsports.com

to steve c core for helping me to put the show together uh friend derrick marcil he's going to

be helping as well uh with adding some sound design here so um yeah appreciate you all just

trying to help me um i'm about maxed out on talent and time so yeah truly truly thankful there and

could have a pretty important thing here on wednesday so you're watching if this is a wednesday

when you're watching it today um and have a really important medical appointment we're headed to and

based on the outcome there um yeah hoping that we have uh positive positive things on the horizon

here at home so all that said that's the end of a super extendo first attempt at the week in indy car

set down in reference to the chassis set downs that happened after a session after a race benchmark

all the chassis settings to see if they migrated at all during the race i probably should have

mentioned that at the front of the show for those of no clue what the heck the set down

references but there you go uh other than that i'll just shut up now and talk to y'all here

Buick Century

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